


Alterations

by idoltina



Series: Garden of Shadows [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sabrina the Teenage Witch Fusion, F/M, Halloween, Halloween Costumes, Magic, Modern Era, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-23
Updated: 2017-02-23
Packaged: 2018-09-26 09:45:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9884210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idoltina/pseuds/idoltina
Summary: Some long-standing traditions never change. For half-witch Regina Mills, her Halloween costume is one of them. When she discovers she’s pregnant with her first child, however, she’s forced to concede that some alterations need to be made. Luckily, her husband is more than happy to lend a helping hand, but he is not alone in making some changes to some long-standing traditions that year.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OutlawQueenLuvr](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OutlawQueenLuvr/gifts), [odangoatama](https://archiveofourown.org/users/odangoatama/gifts).



> **Warnings:** references to previous character death, references to previous faux attempted murder
> 
> The _incredible_ cover art for this piece is by [laura-p-g](http://laura-p-g.tumblr.com/) and can be found in full [here](http://laura-p-g.tumblr.com/post/152272581759/requested-by-rcgalbeliever-for-idoltina-and-her).

The witches and warlocks of the Other Realm take Halloween very, very seriously. Regina learned that lesson quite well the year she’d turned sixteen when Aunt Morgana had insisted upon her abandoning the perfectly normal carnival her school held in favor of attending Great-Aunt Mildred’s annual Halloween gala. Mildred, being in her nine hundreds, happened to take celebrations to a whole new level, and Regina had found her inaugural attendance to the soiree to be a rather spirited affair in an asylum where she and Morgana had spent the evening trying to outrun Dr. Frankenstein’s deranged cousin and a beast she’s fairly certain was the conglomeration of Jekyll and Hyde.

(The night hadn’t been an entire wash, though. Aunt Mildred — once she’d called off the antics of her “entertainment” — had been the one to inform Regina about the special allowance made by the Other Realm on All Hallow’s Eve: each of their kind is allowed an hour with a soul that has long since passed. And Regina — well, the fact that she’d been able to spend any time with her late father at all had far eclipsed the earlier chaos of that night.)

Still, needless to say, Regina has since opted out of Aunt Mildred’s rather… eccentric parties, and she’s since spent every Halloween celebrating in the mortal realm instead. And she _does_ celebrate: it’s one of the only times of the year her kind can really be open about things, something she can absolutely appreciate since — well, since Daniel. Regina decorates the house and yard the same way mortals arrange light displays at Christmas and resolutely ignores the spike in her electric bill. She brews an extra special batch of the potion on page sixty-six of her spellbook — a glowing mist that surrounds the house — both to honor the dead and to make sure none of their corpses cross her thresholds. Aunt Morgana remembers to send something from wherever she’s currently off exploring the galaxy that year. Regina makes sure to send Mildred a thank-you gift when she declines the invitation to the party each year. She puts up extra protection spells around the property for Luna and even lets her play at parlor tricks with some of the trick-or-treaters (because on Halloween, no one thinks twice about a talking black cat, and Luna _relishes_ in the extra conversation).

Beyond all of that, though, Regina likes to change up her festivities every year to keep things interesting. Every handful of years, she’ll camp out at home and marathon some of her favorite horror films. Some years she’ll deign to attend a party or carnival with some of her friends. Belle, in particular, is very good about roping Regina into all sorts of ridiculous events: the year they’d attended the cornfield maze had been one of the more memorable ones — Regina’s magic had gone haywire for days after.

(She thinks that may have been the result of some lingering magical form of PTSD from Aunt Mildred’s party, but naturally, there had been no way to be certain.)

There are exactly two traditions that Regina absolutely upholds every year, without fail.

The first is her annual visit with her late father, Henry, in the Other Realm’s All Hallow’s Eve channel. It’s the only time during the year that Regina deigns to make a trip to the Other Realm anymore, the only time she risks crossing paths with her mother since she’d enacted the barrier spell around her property. But it’s a risk Regina takes happily — she refuses to let Mother take this from her, too — and it’s one that has paid off every year thus far. Regina gets to keep her father appraised of what’s going on in her life since his passing thirteen years ago (a bright spot for him, she knows, in an otherwise rather dull afterlife), and the universe — or fates, whichever has control over such things — sees fit to reward her by keeping her mother at arm’s length.

The second tradition is donning the exact same costume regardless of how she chooses to celebrate. Because Halloween is a time of celebration for her people, and it is the one night of the year where she can absolutely embrace everything that she is without question or concern. So every year, Regina slips into her horribly cliche, traditional, scrappy black witch’s outfit, complete with pointed hat and a broom, and she resolutely does not care about the horrible, cheesy irony of her own little inside joke.

It’s the one night of the year she feels most in her skin, and she wouldn’t trade it for anything.

After Robin, certain things change.

Oh, most things stay the same. The declined invitation and thank-you gift to Aunt Mildred; the brewing of the protective potion; Luna’s party tricks; Aunt Morgana’s annual wish-you-were here postcard with tacky pumpkin stickers that Regina adores; the ridiculous amounts of decorations that go up — all of that doesn’t change. Some of it is an adjustment for Robin over a few years, though. He ends up carrying a flashlight and a bundle of extra batteries in his satchel just so he can navigate his way between the house and his car, and it takes two Halloweens for him to learn to navigate the chaos that Regina’s abundance of decorations can cause. The year they get engaged is a battle of wills: Robin is determined to accept the invitation to Mildred’s party, insists that he wants to meet her family, and it’s only when Regina finally regales him with the tale of narrowly escaping being set on fire that he finally relents and agrees to let her host a dinner party _not_ on Halloween instead.

This year, though — this year, things are more different than they ever have been before.

This year, they learn that they’re expecting their first child (first, Regina ends up reminding him soon after they find out she’s pregnant, because she is still a Grant, even if she doesn’t speak to her mother anymore, and all Grants end up with biological siblings in some capacity). By the time Halloween rolls around — their seventh together, third married — Regina is just two weeks shy of hitting the halfway point in her pregnancy, and she’d been forced to concede at the beginning of the month that her usual costume was just not going to fit the same way this time around. So she’d spent idle evenings over the course of October slowly making alterations to her costume — letting it out in places here and there, lengthening the skirt, reluctantly adding striped stockings to the ensemble, swapping out her heels for a pair of fashionable boots instead. She indulges in a little magic to assist in her mortal adjustments; she wants to be comfortable, after all, and tailoring has never really been her strong suit.

And so, on Halloween morning when she’s standing in front of the full-length mirror in their bedroom surveying her handiwork, she finds that she’s rather proud of her handiwork. The edges of her skirt still manage to hit just above her knees even with the ever-growing curve of her belly, and the black and purple combination she’d chosen for her leggings provides enough contrast to give the whole look some stark definition. The shoes are definitely more comfortable too; she’s felt a little off-balance her entire pregnancy so far, and she finds herself grateful for the added width the boots provide. Still, she can definitely _feel_ the difference in her body overall, and it’s with a heavy sigh that she anchors her hands on her hips and wrinkles her nose at her reflection. “Well, baby, I suppose this is as good as it’s going to get this year.”

She turns away from the mirror and takes the two steps to their bedroom desk to retrieve the next-to-last piece of her costume. She reaches for the pointed hat but gets distracted halfway there, fingertips brushing over the open page of her advanced copy of Robin’s new book on the Salem witch trials. She thumbs over the italics printed on the dedication page — _For Regina, who makes each and every day more magical than the last_ — and smiles fondly, tears stinging unbidden at her eyes.

When she turns to face the mirror again, she adjusts the hat atop her head and thinks that maybe _as good as it’s going to get_ is actually a little better than the years that have come before.

The baby shifts a little inside of her, almost as if to say _obviously, Mom, you’ve got me this year_ , and something in her settles.

She smiles all the way downstairs.

Robin’s already in the kitchen when she emerges, reading glasses perched on his nose as he peruses the morning paper and nurses his coffee from the _Mortal: Requires Caffeine_ mug she’d given him as a birthday gift two years ago. He glances up at her as she descends from the landing, matching her smile with his own, beaming and bright and bemused. He’s always found her choice of Halloween costume equal parts charming and hysterical ever since he’d learned the truth about her six years ago, and this year seems to be no different; if anything, she thinks he looks more enchanted than usual. “Good morning,” he greets warmly, hiding his grin behind his mug. “Don’t you look particularly bewitching today.”

Regina rolls her eyes but chuckles dryly anyway, dropping a kiss to his cheek before moving to the kitchen island where her own mug — _I’m a real witch in the morning_ — is waiting for her, steam spiraling as her teabag steeps. “A regular Samantha Stephens,” she murmurs, blowing a little to cool the liquid off. Robin settles the newspaper down on the table and glances over his shoulder at her, eyes twinkling. It’s an old joke — one they make far too regularly — but it, like so many other things around this time of year, is tradition. The year they’d gotten engaged, Mother had tried to find a way around Regina’s barrier spell by introducing herself to Robin, and all it had gotten her was a hard line and a plethora of _Clue_ jokes that have since made the 80s cult classic part of their annual Halloween celebrations if only because Robin thinks it’s _hysterical_.

(She’d known, then — even without stones from the North Star — that her soul had found its mate.)

“You don’t have your broom,” Robin remarks after a moment.

“I thought I’d have some tea before I took flight,” she teases, smiling against the rim of her cup. “It’s in the —”

“— the dining room, yes, I know,” he supplies for her, earning him an arched eyebrow in silent question. But he doesn’t answer her right away, just surveys her quietly for a moment before pulling his glasses off and rising from his chair, holding up a finger to say _wait_.

Bemused, Regina shakes her head as he ducks into the dining room, and she lets her gaze wander for a moment as she sips her tea. Luna’s already out in the side yard this morning under the apple tree, rolling happily in the leaves that have fallen. Regina’s smile softens and widens as she swallows a sip down; there are times, like now, when she’s particularly grateful her family ended up being designated as Luna’s caretakers for the remainder of her sentence. Autumn is the favorite season in their household largely due to Halloween, true enough, but Luna in particular has taken a shine to it since her transformation. Flora and foliage isn’t something that Luna had grown up with back home, and Regina knows that she finds it equal parts fascinating and delightful.

“I, uh — I hope you don’t mind,” Robin says as he reenters the kitchen, chuckling lowly and reclaiming her attention, “but I made my own small alteration to your costume.” Regina narrows her eyes, confused and more than a little curious, and the mug is halfway to her mouth when he comes to stop in front of her, broomstick in hand. She takes it in, eyes scanning as she tries to figure out what he changed, but her study lasts barely longer than a few seconds before she spies the addition he’s made.

Tied around the handle of her broomstick is a yellow, triangular sign with bold black lettering that reads _Baby on Board_.

Regina chokes out a startled laugh and sets her mug back down. “You are… ridiculous,” she murmurs around a sigh, reaching out to wrap her fingers around the handle as well.

“And you love me for it,” he throws back, voice low and warm as he adjusts his own grip on the broomstick, his hand brushing against hers.

Regina shakes her head but can’t bite back her smile, so it’s with a feigned reluctant sigh that she leans in a little closer until her belly brushes against him, closing the gap between them. “And I love you for it,” she agrees. He ducks down for a kiss that has her humming pleasantly against his mouth, free hand gripping her arm to balance them both, and she smiles into the second kiss he takes, and the third, loving the way he lingers a little longer.

“Toast is up,” Luna announces, interrupting their moment very deliberately. Regina breaks away with a bitten-back grin, but Robin ignores Luna’s pointed glare entirely and dives in for one last kiss pressed against Regina’s neck. “ _Honestly_ ,” Luna grumbles, sniffing rather disdainfully as she brushes by them on the island on the way to her bowl. “If I’d known I was going to have to spend more than half a century playing _chaperone_ to a couple of hormonally-challenged mortals, I might have more seriously considered that internment camp on Neptune.”

“Somehow I don’t think the service would have been quite up to par,” Robin muses, chuckling lowly as he props the broomstick up against the wall and makes his way to the pantry. “I’m not sure you’d survive a life without Fancy Feast.”

“Yes, well,” Luna says, sighing longsufferingly as she waits for Robin to open the can of wet food for her, “I suppose you’re good for something.” Robin offers up no snarking remark in return, but Regina doesn’t miss the smile he throws her way as he serves Luna breakfast and reaches out to scratch behind her ears. Regina shakes her head at the way Luna preens under the attention; even two hundred years into her sentence as a feline, Luna is still every bit the heiress she used to be before she’d attempted planetary domination.

Regina leaves them to it and makes her way around to the other side of the island where the magical toaster is hooked up (strategically, because Robin had nearly set fire to the kitchen one morning when he’d been too groggy to remember that she did, in fact, own two toasters for a very specific reason). She plucks the mail from the slot with ease, warmth zinging in her chest automatically at the feeling of the thick cardstock between her fingers, and even though she knows who it’s from without reading it, she relishes in it all the same. Bright orange stickers beam up at her from the postcard as her eyes scan the swirling script, lip bitten idly between her teeth. “Aunt Morgana says hello,” she passes along, still half-reading the rest of the message.

“Where is she this time?” Robin asks, shuffling around the kitchen as he cleans up.

“Bermuda,” Regina answers. "Something about Merlin leaving artifacts buried there or something, I don’t know. She’s pretty deep down the rabbit hole of trying to piece some of his work together. I’m not sure exactly what it is she’s looking for.”

“Probably pages to one of his books,” Luna offers between bites of wild salmon primavera. “Your Aunt Mildred always said he was one for scavenger hunts.”

Regina merely _hmm_ s in response, mentally filing the information away for later. She’s sure that if Morgana succeeds in her little quest, it’ll shift the balance in the Other Realm for a while, but that’s a concern Regina will only carry if she must. For now, she finishes reading her aunt’s address, running her thumb over the pumpkin sticker next to her signature, but she stops when she gets to the postscript at the bottom, heart stuttering in her chest.

 _By the way_ , Aunt Morgana writes, _I called in a favor with a mousey little witch who works in channel services. Turn to page ninety-nine; I have a feeling you’ll need it._

Regina exhales sharply and drops the postcard onto the island counter quickly, pointing her finger at the counter in a practiced motion to make her spellbook appear in front of her. She resolutely ignores Luna’s _Didn’t anyone tell you it’s rude to read at the table?_ and quickly flips to page ninety-nine of her book, dragging her fingers down the page. “Regina,” Robin says carefully from across the kitchen. “What is it?”

“I put in a request,” she says, only half paying attention as she goes over the spell in front of her. “Last month, I put in a request with the Other Realm channel services for tonight. I was hoping they’d —”

The toaster _pings_ once more, and Regina’s reaching for the (much flimsier) piece of paper lightning fast, breath quickening at the sight of the official seal of the Other Realm departmental services. Vaguely, she’s aware that her husband has moved next to her; she doesn’t even startle when he brushes her hair away from her neck, lips pressing gently below her ear in encouragement. “Darling, what is it?”

“My request,” she breathes, eyes locking on the words _Locksley_ and _permitted_ on the page. “They granted my request, I —” She stops and swallows hard, dropping the permit to rest on the counter with the postcard, and she turns into his arms, eyes watering. “The channel they open to communicate with the dead — it’s only for witches and warlocks. It’s not a service they provide for mortals, for obvious reasons, but I thought — with us being married, and the baby on the way — that they might let you come with me this year.”

Robin’s eyes narrow even as his hands settle on her hips, his thumbs rubbing soothingly along the curve of her belly. “You want me to go with you,” he asks, clearly caught off guard, “to… see your father?”

Her smile falters, just a little, as she rolls her shoulders back. “Do you… not want to go?”

“Oh, no, it’s not that,” he laughs, reaching a hand up to tuck her hair behind her ear, careful not to knock her hat off. “It’s just — you usually go to great lengths to keep us both out of the Other Realm as much as possible.”

“This is different,” she argues. “The channels are private and restricted now. I don’t have to worry as much about crossing paths with my mother.”

“I know,” he says, cupping her jaw with his palm to comfort her. “That’s… sort of my point. This _is_ different — special. Your visits with your father on Halloween are usually _your_ tradition,” he reasons. “I just don’t want to intrude upon that.”

Her smile comes back in full force at that, eyes shining as she fights valiantly against the (stupid, hormonal, _why_ ) tears threatening to fall. “It’s not intruding if you’ve been invited,” she laughs wetly. “I want you to be there, at least — at least for this,” she says quietly, bringing their hands together to rest over the swell of her belly. “I want him to be able to see my family at least once.” She pauses, just for a beat, before lifting her head to look at him again. “I don’t mind breaking with tradition every once in awhile, especially for something like this. It’s not — he wasn’t part of that world,” she adds, feeling like she’s fumbling to explain where she’s coming from with this. “He was part of this one. These visits — they’re a way to bridge the gap between them. And you?” she says, soft and low as she leans in a little closer. “You’re very good at that.”

Again, Robin returns her smile with ease, affirming without words that he knows what she’s referring to — his thesis, for one, and the book tucked away in their bedroom upstairs. He curls himself around her, hands anchoring at the back of her neck and small of her back, pulling her flush against him. “In that case,” he murmurs, “I would be happy to finally meet him.”


End file.
